Why Working Harder Will Not Make You Productive

“We only have so much energy for our work, for our relationships, for ourselves. A smart person understands this and guards it carefully. Meanwhile, idiots focus on marginal productivity hacks and gains while they leak out energy each passing day.”

Ryan Holiday (Author, The Obstacle Is The Way)

“We will be more successful in all our endeavors if we can let go of the habit of running all the time, and take little pauses to relax and re-center ourselves. And, we’ll also have a lot more joy in living.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (Buddhist Monk)

“Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things.”

Peak performance is mastered by being both efficient and effective at the same time.

Without turning into a stressed out monkey or hyper-scheduled freak.

The solution lies in the Law of Relaxed Productivity.

The Law of Relaxed Productivity states, “The more effective your process, the more productive you will be.”

The more efficient your process, the more relaxed you will be.

The key to being productive and relaxed at the same time is to be as effective and efficient as possible at the same time.

Anyone can be either effective or efficient, but few can do both simultaneously.

Many people are very good at being extremely productive and stressed out of their mind at the same time.

Others are very good at being transcendently relaxed and happy without ever being productive (they’re called hippies).

But can you do both?

Can you be both effective and efficient at the same time, or both productive and relaxed at the same time?

Abraham Lincoln said yes, you can.

Lincoln once wrote, “Give me 6 hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first 4 sharpening the axe.”

What did he mean by this?

Why was balancing the time spent sharpening and the time spent chopping important?

The answer lies in balancing effectiveness with efficiency.

In the mind of Lincoln, both efficiency and effectiveness are important for peak performance, but Lincoln favored effectiveness over efficiency 2:1 when it came to performing well.

If you follow Lincoln’s model of peak performance — valuing both effectiveness and efficiency but favoring the former 2:1 — you will not only excel in every area of your life, but you will also perfectly follow the law of being productive and relaxed at the same time.

This 2:1 ratio allows you to work smarter, not harder.

Why Working Harder Isn’t Smarter

In fact, it’s pretty dumb.

Even though the 2:1 ratio seems simple, few people have mastered it.

One reason is because of competing demands for your focus, information overload, and a backwards message that values long hours of hard work.

The International Workplace Productivity Survey, commissioned by LexisNexis, found a majority of workers reported increases in the volume of information they have to deal with at work, and 62% of them admitted that as a result, it negatively impacts the quality of their work.

Even if they’re meeting their outcomes, they’re increasingly inefficient.

Being ineffective comes from compromised focus and competing stimuli.

So does being inefficient.

Longer working days result in less sleep and compromised focus.

The whole thing is a set-up to work against you and if you’re not actively strategizing against it, you’ll get assimilated into low productivity and “worker bee” mentality.

And, you’d be part of the majority.

Additionally, according to the New York Timesarticle citing studies on productivity, working more contributed to lack of sleep in 400 employees (less than 6 hours a night) and was the number 1 predictor of job burn-out.

Additionally more than ⅓ of workers forego lunch breaks and 59% work on their vacations.

Continuing to work when you should be resting, and then stimulating with coffee, sugar, or sheer willpower, overrides your body’s natural rhythms.

With adequate sleep, however, overall physical and cognitive performance increased across the board.

Because your body needs renewal.

In the body and the mind.

Working longer and without breaks (or naps or vacations) will leave you overtired and stressed, but also less able to reach optimal focus.

Over 60 years of research has confirmed that people perform optimally (both effectively and efficiently) when they take breaks every 90 minutes.

Discussed in an article by PayScale, researchers out of Florida State University studied “elite performers,” finding that uninterrupted focus for 90 minutes or less, with breaks in between, contributed to maximum productivity.

Harnessing efficiency, these people rarely worked more than 4.5 hours a day.

Twice as much high-level work in half the time.

Sound like a familiar ratio?

How To Use The Law of Relaxed Productivity To Do More

The truth is, you work best when you’re focused and relaxed at the same time.

If you want to be successful, you’ll start implementing strategies to optimize both and making the Law of Relaxed Productivity work in your favor.

Because, if you can do everything on your list in half the time, you still have all those good hours to build in more purpose and passion into your life.

The Law of Relaxed Productivity is a framework for you to master these 2 things…

1. Optimal effectiveness.

If you think your long to-do list means you’re productive, no matter how much you cross off, you’re just wrong.

If you think doing endurance work, boasting no breaks and 15-hour long days, means you’re a workhorse of mass proportion… you’re still wrong.

The reality is that long lists and long hours only make you look productive.

And, they might even impress your boss, but they won’t bring you to your goals.

This combination of being in ultimate control of your life and your schedule makes you unstoppable.

Being effective is about mastering your time. Being efficient is about mastering your focus. To optimize both simultaneously, you need to take control over your schedule and your environment. You can achieve the benefits of the Law of Relaxed Productivity, where you work at your best and accomplish more in record time, without sacrificing your health and the things you love. To produce at your full potential, you must be strategic with your time, align with your purpose, and fiercely protect your focus.

To learn more about Why Working Harder Will Not Make You Productive, and to get instant access to exclusive training videos, case studies, insider documents, and my private online network, get on the wait list to create your Escape Plan and Achieve Intelligent Alignment.